


Do You Miss Me?

by Imaginary_Wolf



Category: Formula 1 RPF
Genre: Based on an interview, Fluff, M/M, Singapore 2019
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-19
Updated: 2020-08-19
Packaged: 2021-03-06 00:42:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,293
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25994659
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Imaginary_Wolf/pseuds/Imaginary_Wolf
Summary: “Do you miss me?”It comes so out of the blue, in the middle of Max’s sentence about covering their cars in glitter, and it catches Max off guard for a second.Max doesn’t know how to respond to that, too aware of the cameras on him, so he settles for, “Do you miss me?”
Relationships: Daniel Ricciardo/Max Verstappen
Comments: 16
Kudos: 105





	Do You Miss Me?

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this little thing really quickly after watching their interview analysing each other's laps with Sky at Singapore 2019, for about the hundredth time. So I just thought I'd share it. It starts with the ending of that interview which is on Youtube if you haven't seen it. Although if you're a Maxiel fan I'm sure you've already seen the video!
> 
> Also, there is a tiny bit of Dutch in this...and I used google translate...
> 
> EDIT: Thank you to lovelylittlelion for helping me to change the bit of Dutch to sound more natural. Very much appreciated :)
> 
> I hope you like it!

“Do you miss me?”

It comes so out of the blue, in the middle of Max’s sentence about covering their cars in glitter, and it catches Max off guard for a second. He looks at Daniel a little blankly for a fraction of a moment. He’s surprised but he supposes he shouldn’t be, this is _Daniel_ after all. He’s never been one to shy away from things, seeming to just come out with anything that he’s thinking without much of a filter. But the way he’d said it had been curious and _genuine_ , seeming a little out of place alongside the joking tone of the rest of the interview.

Max doesn’t know how to respond to that, too aware of the cameras on him, so he settles for, “Do _you_ miss me?”

“I asked first,” Daniel shoots back with a grin, and Max can’t help but let out a little laugh, he should have known he couldn’t get away with it that easily.

He hedges for a moment, but he can’t help but admit it, feeling too much pressure to respond with Daniel’s eyes on him, not enough time to come up with a witty response, “Errrm…I do miss it sometimes, yeah.”

Daniel looks down for a moment, “Yeah,” He says, and Max suddenly feels a bit awkward. He probably read Dan wrong and was supposed to make a joke out of it, but he came out with something much too honest. It’s only for a fraction of a second though because of course Daniel comes back with something ridiculous.

“When we shared bunk beds?”

Max talks over him before really hearing what he’d said, in his hurry to fill the silence, “When you get into like your qualifying session, you know? And then trying to get the best out of each other.”

Dan is now looking at him with oddly serious eyes.

“Seeing my face from across the room,” It’s a stupid joke but the way Dan says it is strangely sincere. Dan breaks eye contact for a second and Max feels his mind reeling for some reason. Why did Dan say that, not even with his usual giant grin? It all seemed too genuine and deliberate for a joking chat for Sky.

Max says something about them sharing rooms but he’s not really concentrating anymore. For a moment it’s a bit uncomfortable as the presenter tries to wrap things up, but suddenly joking jovial Dan is back, saying that it was nice to meet him, smiling again, shaking his hand.

It leaves Max feeling like maybe he imagined the whole thing. Maybe Dan was just joking all along and he’d just read too much into it.

Why did he feel hollow then?

The cameras stop and Dan shakes hands with the presenter before heading off back towards the Renault hospitality. Max shakes the presenters hand too and then jogs to catch up with Dan, still feeling wrong-footed.

“Hey Dan,” Max says as he catches up to him, and then before he can really think about what he’s saying, because he really _has_ missed him, “Do you want to grab some food tonight? We could go to that seafood place we went to last year?”

Dan looks at him with slight surprise. Obviously they’ve seen each other and talked throughout the season, but it’s never quite been the same as when they were teammates. They don’t travel together anymore and they don’t go out to dinner together like they would have in previous years. But Max doesn’t see why they can’t, he can remember how much Dan liked the restaurant last year, and it would be nice to have a catch up away from a race track.

“Early, six pm? I’ll have to be up in the morning to go through things before FP3,” Max adds as Dan just stares at him for a couple of seconds.

“Sure, sounds good.” Dan grins, patting Max on the shoulder again, like he did during the interview. It makes Max remember how much he’s missed the easy touches from Dan. Dan’s a tactile guy and Max isn’t comfortable being like that with anyone else he knows, “I’ll see you later.”

With that Dan heads off down to Renault. Max watches him go for a few seconds before turning round and heading back to Red Bull.

****

Later that day Max is feeling oddly nervous about going out for dinner with Daniel, even though it’s something they’ve done many times before, if not so much recently. It’s half five and he goes to grab his phone to text Dan and ask if they should meet at the restaurant, vaguely wondering if he should have booked a table, when he sees that Dan has already texted him.

_Sorry mate, going over some data stuff this evening at the hotel so won’t be able to make it. Another time?_

Max feels his stomach sink, wondering why he feels so disappointed, it’s not like he won’t see Dan down at the track tomorrow anyway.

He quickly types out a quick text to say tell Dan that it’s no problem, trying to ignore the feeling of dismay growing in him and wondering what he’s going to do for the evening. He’s spent most of the day doing media things and he was really looking forward to just chatting to someone when he doesn’t have to think about it so hard, talking to Dan was always easy.

For a second he sits down heavily on the bed and then decides, Dan still needs to eat. He’ll go and pick up some food for them both and take it over to Dan’s hotel. That’s not weird, it’s a nice thing to do? It’s not like he has anything else to do and the hotel Renault are staying at is only ten minutes down the road with the restaurant in-between. He gets up and leaves his hotel room before he can overthink it.

****

An hour later he’s standing outside Daniel’s hotel with a bag of takeaway, paper plates and cutlery in his hand, wondering if Dan is going to think he’s lost his mind showing up at his hotel without any warning.

He walks into the fancy stone reception and heads straight up to the desk, “I’m here to see Daniel Ricciardo,” He says, “Could you ring up to his room and tell him I’m here, Max Verstappen.”

The receptionist smiles and nods, she taps at the computer for a moment before picking up the phone. Max zones out for a minute and thinks that he really should have texted Dan first to tell him he was coming.

“He says that’s ok,” She says in broken English, “I will let you into the lift.”

She guides him over to the lift and uses a card to call it, “He’s on the seventh floor, room 732.”

“Thank you.”

As the lift rises Max becomes more and more nervous, he feels his phone buzz in his pocket and takes it out to see a text from Dan.

_You’d better be heading up to my room right now_

Max frowns for a second, a slight laugh escaping him.

_That sounded weird. I meant I hope it’s actually you and not a stalker who has found out where I’m staying_

Max shakes his head fondly and quickly types back.

_I don’t know what you’re talking about?_

Max heads off down the hallway and finds room 732, knocking on the door and feeling a little foolish. Did friends turn up randomly with food?

A smiling Dan opens the door, “Maxy,” He notices the bag of food immediately, “Did you bring me food?” His grin widens further.

“Errr…yeah. Just thought you might want some if you were stuck going over data. I was already heading down there anyway,” Max lies.

Dan gestures for him to come in and that’s when Max notices Nico sat down in an armchair in the far side of the room.

“Hoe gaat het?” Nico greets him in Dutch with a little wave.

“Hallo,” Max says in return, a little taken aback. He hadn’t expected anyone else to be here.

“We were just going over some track data,” Daniel explains, gesturing to the tablet in Nico’s hand.

Nico locks the tablet and it goes blank, “Better keep this away from you, wouldn’t want to give you any ideas,” He jokes good-naturedly.

Max smiles slightly but is still hovering awkwardly, takeaway bag clutched in his left hand.

“I only brought enough food for two,” Max says, only realising how rude he sounds after he’s said it. He actually quite likes Nico, they get on well, he backtracks quickly, “I can leave this with you two to eat if you want?” He puts it down on the walnut coffee table in front of Nico.

“Oh no,” Nico says, getting up from the armchair now, “I was going to head off soon and find some food anyway. You two have fun,” To Max’s embarrassment he _winks_ at Dan and as he passes Max he taps him on the shoulder, speaking quietly to him in Dutch, “Hij mist jou ook. Je hoeft je geen zorgen te maken.”

Max feels his face flush slightly as he hears Nico leave the room behind him, Dan saying goodbye to him.

“What was that about?” Dan asks with a laugh, Max just shakes his head and starts to unpack the food. “You’re amazing, Max, bringing food to my door. What did I do to deserve this.” Dan helps setting out the paper plates and utensils on the nearby table.

“Just thought you might be hungry and bored. Didn’t think you’d be going over stuff with Nico.”

“Nah, we were pretty much done mate. Ah I had this last time, it was so good.” Daniel serves his meal onto a plate and sits down to eat as Max joins him.

Dan takes one bite and makes a slightly obsene face, “Mmm, so good.” Max smiles slightly, glad that Dan has taken him showing up so well.

They chat for a little bit, speaking briefly about their time in Singapore last year, a little about the days practice, although Max notices that Dan avoids talking about their earlier interview, changing the subject quickly when Max jokes about it.

There is a natural lull in the conversation as they both finish their food, and Max feels himself speak before he’s really thought about it, surprised by what comes out of his mouth.

“You didn’t answer my question earlier. Do you miss me?”

Dan fixes him with an odd look, his smile faltering for a moment, before answering with more honesty than Max was expecting, “Of course I do, Maxy.”

Max’s eyebrows shoot up, “Oh.”

There’s another long silence where they just look at each other. Max feels like they’re teetering on the edge of something, the same as they were earlier but there had been too many people and cameras around to do anything about it.

“We never really talked about it, did we?”

Max raises his eyebrows in question.

“Me leaving.”

Max feels out of his depth now, they don’t talk seriously like this anymore. He doesn’t know where Daniel is going with this, if there is any point talking about this now, so long after.

“You know it’s not your fault that I left, don’t you?” Dan asks him, concern in his eyes.

Max feels his throat tighten at Dan’s words, at the genuine tone. They had never really discussed Dan leaving for Renault. Dan had called him one day and told him over the phone that he had made the decision to switch teams and Max hadn’t known what to say. Not long after that the news had come out that Dan was leaving and the media had painted a bad picture of their relationship, suggesting that Dan was leaving Red Bull because of Max. Along with their own team boss suggesting that Dan was running from a fight in his interview with Netflix, it had definitely made Max think that he’d driven Dan away. But they’d never really discussed it, and Dan had been just a friendly as ever with him towards the end of the season, so Max had decided it was something better left unsaid.

Apparently Dan now thought differently.

“I...” Max tries to say something but can’t figure out what and Dan sighs.

“Well, not directly. It just wasn’t working for me at Red Bull. Their focus was obviously more with you, I needed a fresh start. But it wasn’t your fault.”

Max wants to protest, he stands up running his hand through his hair in frustration, “I didn’t want you to leave,” He says, because he knows it’s not really his fault, even if he does sometimes feel bad.

Dan stands up, “I didn’t want to leave you,” He says softly and then places his hand on Max’s cheek. Max looks up at him with surprise.

They stand there like that for a moment, Dan’s hand warm on his face. For a second Dan’s eyes dart down to glance at Max’s lips, then back up to his eyes. There’s a question in Dan’s eyes, and Max feels like he finally understands. Why he’d been so blindsided when Dan left. Why he’d felt so lonely this year without Dan around. Why Dan’s ‘do you miss me’ had hit him so hard.

He can suddenly see it all so clearly and he steps forward, pressing his lips to Dan’s in a chaste kiss. He closes his eyes as he feels his lips brush against Dan’s chapped ones.

Dan places his hand around the back of his head and deepens the kiss. When they break away, he’s smiling, “Finally Maxy.”

**Author's Note:**

> Somehow both my fics so far have been around them missing each other. Not sure how that happened it wasn't intentional. Anyway, thanks for reading :)


End file.
